


Just Checking

by jscribbles



Series: The Gracie Verse [2]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Crying, Destiel - Freeform, Flu, M/M, Sick Cas, Sick Dean, Sick baby, Vomiting, crying cas, parental freakout, references to baby poop, sam is helpful, stomach flu
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-03
Updated: 2018-12-03
Packaged: 2019-09-06 00:33:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,366
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16821568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jscribbles/pseuds/jscribbles
Summary: The apple pie life Dean and Cas made for themselves with their newborn daughter is rudely disturbed by a breakout of the stomach flu that rips through every member of their household. Dean still manages to make jokes, Cas is over it, and baby Grace is a cesspool of disease. Gross.A companion ficlet to 'Your Story Isn't Over Yet'.





	Just Checking

**Author's Note:**

> I couldn't let this 'verse go just yet. Say hello to time stamp/ficlet number one. There will be more to follow in the upcoming weeks. ;)
> 
> Many thanks to MalMuses for the beta edit.

“Hey Sam. No… No, she’s fine,” Dean said into his phone, head pressed tightly against his shoulder where the device was sandwiched. “She’s fine. Doctor said it’s normal. Not ideal, but normal… Yeah, we’re exhausted…. Mhmn… Yeah… They made us wait for four hours, it was so uncool.”

Dean adjusted the diaper bag over his shoulder, struggling to slip it off his shoulder, hold the phone against his ear, and hold the door open for Cas, who walked in sluggishly behind him, holding Gracie against his chest and shoulder with his arm, the one hand dragging a car seat behind him. While Dean struggled, Cas nudged the hallway light on with his elbow.

“Thanks for checking in, Sam… No, you don’t have to come over. It’s fine. We’re probably going to bed now. It’s like four hours past our bedtime,” Dean laughed, though it was tight and strained. He turned into their living room while Cas disappeared upstairs without a word. 

Dean threw the diaper bag onto the couch, wincing as his back popped in protest. “Yeah, I know it’s only two AM. I think 10PM is a pretty decent bedtime for two bone-tired exhausted people, okay?” 

Dean rolled his eyes as Sam mocked him. “Whatever, dude. Fine, fine; we’re boring parents now, I get it. You try having a sick baby screaming and puking all over you for hours and then get back to me about how lively and spry you would be.”

He collapsed onto the couch, staring up at the ceiling while Sam mocked him for a few more minutes. He rubbed at his forehead and eyes as he heard Gracie screaming again upstairs. She’d been screaming for days, developed a bit of a fever, and had been throwing up for the past twenty-four hours. To say that things had been stressful in their house for the past day was an understatement.

“Okay, okay, bitch,” Dean sighed. “I gotta go. Gracie’s losing her shit upstairs and between you and me, Cas looks 150% over it. He hasn’t said a word since we left the hospital. I’m on puke duty tonight, I think, ‘cause Cas was on it last night. Mhmn… yeah, maybe we’ll see you tomorrow. Breakfast would be good, though sanitize every part of your body before you walk into my house. The doc said she probably got sick from a visitor or a trip out in public… Nah, man, I’m sure it wasn’t you, don’t—Okay. Mhmn. Anyway, I gotta go.” 

Sam’s voice buzzed on the other end of the phone. Dean’s lip twitched into a tired smile. “Yeah, man. Love you too. See you.”

He clicked the disconnect icon and threw his phone aside, pausing to stare up at the ceiling. He felt the ache in his bones from sleep deprivation and the stress hangover. He had faced monsters and demons for decades; he knew how to handle danger. He knew how to stab and enchant and salt and burn dangers to his family into oblivion. He was not prepared for his three-month-old daughter to come down with the stomach flu. She was too young, he and Cas were new parents, and Google told them shit that scared him to his core. The doctors and nurses at the ER had been patient with them, understanding why they’d brought her in, but eventually, after a four hour wait and another hour being seen to by doctors and nurses, it turned out Gracie was fine. She was hydrated, she was waking up easily, acting normally in between her puking fits, and was just a victim to a nasty little stomach bug.

Still, it had been scary, Dean had rationalized to Cas on the ride home, trying to erase the feeling of being stupid for freaking out. He’d made a mental note to minimize symptom-Googling in the future.

His back protesting, Dean used the armrest to pull himself to his feet, a long exhale pushing itself past his lips as he felt the pull of sleep. He did a sweep of the main floor, shutting blinds, locking windows and doors, and making sure the salt taped down along the entrances hadn’t been tampered with. Then he shut off all the lights and climbed their rickety steps to the second storey.

Their top floor was small and cramped, with enough room for a landing and entrances to the bedrooms and bathroom. Dean closed the door to the spare room, shut off the bathroom light, pausing to shake his head at the mess of diapers on the counter. He and Cas had been admittedly a bit frantic earlier as they gathered Gracie’s things and shoved them into an old duffle bag. Once upon a time (i.e. three months ago) that bag had carried guns, knives, iron crow bars, holy water, holy oil, and first aid supplies. Now it had half of those things, and also formula, diapers, several pastel coloured onesies, and baby powder, to name a few items.

Dean walked past their bedroom and into Grace’s nursery. They’d brought over her furniture from the bunker, as well as the light fixtures and the mobile. Cas had started painting the ceiling with a galaxy again, but turns out having a newborn didn’t afford him much time to finish. So, Grace got to stare up at Dean’s glue-on glow-in-the-dark stars instead. 

Dean stopped beside the crib as Cas lowered their small, sick daughter into her bed. She didn’t wake, though she did whimper a bit as she rubbed her troubled little face into the mattress and wriggled her fingers a bit. From the looks of it, she’d be up and screaming again in less than an hour, if that.

Cas stood up straight, hands gripping the edge of the crib as he stared very seriously and solemnly down at her. Dean gently dragged a hand down his back.

“Well, that was a relief, huh?” he whispered, glancing down at their little girl. “I guess we kinda overreacted. She’ll be fine, Cas. She’ll just scream and puke and shit for a couple days. We just gotta keep her hydrated and fed and—”

Cas nodded, humming what sounded like, “Mhmmn,” before he walked out of the room quietly.

Dean scowled after him. He turned to his daughter, reaching down to tug one of her socks up onto her foot completely before he followed Cas, closing the door just a bit so that they could hear her if she woke up.

Cas was scrubbing his hands under the running faucet in the bathroom when Dean found him, a frown etched onto his face. His eyes were watching his hands, downturned.

Dean leaned against the door and crossed his arms over his chest. “Cas…”

“I’m fine,” Cas said abruptly. He kept scrubbing.

Dean watched Cas’ jaw clench and his throat work. Dean leaned his head against the door, licking his dry lips. “Are you sure? Because you kinda don’t look fine and you haven’t said anything since we left the ER.”

“I told you,” Cas said tightly, “I’m fine. Drop it.”

Noticing Cas’ under-eyes and nose getting red, and his lips get tight, Dean’s voice softened. “Cas, she’s fine and—”

“Drop it.”

“—kids get sick, it’s normal.”

The hands under the running water lifted for a second to pump more soap into their palms. Cas returned his hands under the stream.

“Cas…”

Castiel sniffed a bit, ignored Dean, and kept his eyes downturned. Suds of soap slipped off Cas’ hands, curling down and disappearing down the drain, but he continued scrubbing at nothing.

“Listen, I think your hands are washed now, buddy—”

Cas’ chin crumpled, and his eyes squeezed shut. With a little hiccup, his eyes opened again and he whispered thickly, “I’m doing it wrong.”

Dean pushed off the doorframe a bit, his heart dropping as Cas cried a little, blue eyes rimmed in red, his chin trembling. Dean reached out and turned off the tap.

“All right, all right,” Dean said, his voice low. He stepped forward into the bathroom and pulled Cas into his arms, wrapping them around his shoulders. “I knew something was up.”

After two pitiful little weeps, Cas sniffed a few times and exhaled shakily. “I’m so tired. I’m so tired and I’m doing everything wrong.”

Dean rubbed his back, smiling a bit despite the sad, guilty puddle that was Castiel in his arms. “Dude, it’s almost 2:30 in the morning. No one expects you to get anything right—”

“When I was an angel, time and exhaustion were abstract concepts, but now I struggle to function when an infant wakes me up a few times a night—”

“Eight.”

“What?”

“She woke us up eight times last night.”

Cas sniffed against Dean’s shoulders, his fingers gripping the back of his shirt. “If I were an angel, I would’ve known my own daughter woke me up eight times in one night, but instead, I’m human and absent-minded and exhausted, and crying in the bathroom at two-AM—”

“Awww,” Dean mocked, his chest rumbling with muffled laughter, “he’s so tired and existential.”

“I’m a terrible mom,” Cas whispered, sniffing thickly. Dean patted him on the back. “I let her get sick, knowing her immune system is compromised and frail.”

It couldn’t be helped, Dean laughed again at Cas’ guilt trip ramping up from o to 100. “Cas, you did not ‘let’ her get sick. It’s not your fault—” 

“I went out with her a few days ago,” Cas said, sounding guilty, as if he had revealed a huge secret. “While you were in the shed cleaning your weapons the other day, I took her out. We left the house and there were people. I thought she’d be fine, I didn’t think… I-I wasn’t thinking.”

“Okay, okay,” Dean replied, pulling away and leaning over to yank a baby wipe out of a lumpy package on the counter. He wiped Cas’ face with it and shook his head. “That’s enough of the pity party, Cas. You did not murder our girl just because you went out into the word where _there were people_. It coulda been Sam or Charlie or Jody that got her sick. We’ve had a bunch of people come over to help us out. Stop—”

“I’m sorry. I’m so tired,” Cas breathed, reaching up to pull the baby wipe out of Dean’s grasp. He took it and wiped under his eyes. “This is humiliating.”

Dean leaned forward and pressed a kiss to Cas’ cheek. When he pulled away, Dean whispered quietly, “Don’t worry about it. Between you and me, I had a little cry in the kitchen yesterday when she threw up over my third change of clothes. It was like, the last t-shirt I had left that was clean. Don’t tell Sam or I’ll fucking murder you.”

Cas nodded, dragging the back of his wrists over his eyes. His tongue flicked out to run over his bottom lip and he nodded again, more firmly, dropping his hands to his sides. “Right,” Cas said with a clearing of his throat. “You’re right.”

“You’re pretty tired, huh?” Dean asked, tilting his head, finally catching Cas’ eye. 

Cas flashed him a tight, fake smile. “So tired. My…” His smile dropped quickly, and Cas rubbed his face with his hand, groaning. “Frankly, my entire body aches. I can’t think, everything feels fuzzy. Emotional regulation has been an issue for me the past few days.”

“Go sleep,” Dean ordered, eyes sweeping over Cas’ face, noticing his pale skin and the dark, heavy bangs under his eyes, worse than usual.

“For a bit, perhaps,” Cas replied in a murmur, nodding again. 

As Cas moved around Dean, Dean turned with him, swinging out a hand and smacking him in the ass.

“For longer than a bit, Weepy McGee. I can’t have you falling asleep on baby duty with me tomorrow. I’ll take Grace tonight, you take it easy.”

***

“I’ll take Grace tonight” really meant that Dean fell asleep in his and Cas’ bed with a baby monitor hugged to his chest and all the covers tugged on to his side. It was unfair to Cas, really, that Grace was sleeping decently well on Dean’s watch, while she’d been wailing all last night when it had been Cas’ watch. Still, between crying for forty minutes and managing to get molten-lava shit all over her onesie, Dean had managed to bathe her, feed her, and put her down to sleep.

Dean actually managed to get to sleep in his bed, sneaking in beside Cas, who was dead to the world. He’d enjoyed a quick descent into slumber after making sure he could hear Grace breathing over the monitor.

He would have slept longer, perhaps, if Cas hadn’t woken him up at four by non-stop shifting and turning over. Dean felt the bed dip and the covers shift. Through the haze of half-sleep and half-wakefulness, Dean registered some very concentrated breathing. 

“Cas,” Dean mumbled against the pillow, eyes still closed, “go to sleep, Gracie’s fine.”

He shifted on the bed, tugging his legs up and snuggling his face into his pillow, smacking his lips and letting sleep tug him back into unconsciousness.

He was so close, but then he heard more shifting and movement on the other side of the bed. Cas’ bedside lamp clinked on and yellow light glowed dully behind Dean. He groaned and arranged his tired limbs again, lifting his head off the pillow. 

“Dude.”

Cas didn’t reply, he just shifted. Dean rolled onto his back and reached out, shoving at Cas’ knee as it was folded by Dean’s face. Cas was sitting up, one leg crossed underneath him, the other hanging off the side of the bed. His face was shiny and even in the lamp light, he looked pale.

Dean turned over completely, setting the baby monitor on the bed between them. He winced against the light, his eyes adjusting, and lifted himself onto his elbow.

Peering up at Cas, Dean croaked, “Why are you up?”

Cas responded by breathing very carefully through his lips and wiping the back of his hand over his upper lip, his blue eyes glancing down at Dean. His adam’s apple bobbed a few times.

Dean blinked away sleep and asked again, “Why are you—”

Cas shoved the rest of the covers off of his legs and he walked quickly out of the room, footsteps heavy and insistent. His hand was clamped over his mouth and his shoulders heaved.

“Oh no,” Dean groaned, dropping back onto his pillow.

He pulled the blankets off his legs and dragged his tired body out of bed. His feet dragged across the carpet and he followed Cas, stopping at the bathroom doorway again for the second time that night.

Dean held his hand up against the bright fluorescent light over the mirror and winced, looking down just in time to watch Cas puke into the toilet aggressively, breathing with a wheeze afterwards, panting for a second. Moments later, another wracking tremor passed through him and his shoulders heaved forward, preceding another horrible retch.

“Aw, buddy,” Dean groaned in sympathy, shaking his head. “Not you too.”

“Shut up,” Cas breathed, panting over the toilet, his hand gripping the edge of the bathroom counter.

Dean shifted in his spot, rubbing at his stomach, feeling sympathy pains. 

“Are you sick too or…”

Cas spit into the toilet and flushed, his body shaking, his fingers trembling as he dragged a ball of toilet paper over his mouth sluggishly. “Or what?” he croaked as he sat to the side with a thump, leaning on the bathroom wall like a sweaty, exhausted lump.

“I mean,” Dean rubbed his palms over his hips and stared at Cas through wide, nervous eyes, “you’re not, uh… y’know, pregnant again? You, um, don’t have any of that hidden grace floating around inside again?”

Cas, despite looking ruined, managed to narrow his eyes and scowl deeply, fixing Dean with a nasty look of disbelief. “Is that a joke? Are you joking?”

“Well, just checking!” Dean laughed nervously, “I mean, Grace wasn’t delivered by a stork—”

“Do I look pregnant and woman-shaped to you, Dean?” Cas croaked, though the vitriol in his tone was slightly ineffective when it was followed by the gag into his hand and frantic grab for the toilet, where he projectile vomited like he was an extra in The Exorcist.

“This is a nightmare,” Dean whispered.

Cas remained kneeled in front of the toilet this time, his hand rubbing at his stomach. Almost panicked, staring into the porcelain bowl, he whispered, “Why is this happening to me?”

Dean walked into the washroom and reached over Cas to flush the toilet. “Okay, dude, well, don’t just stare at it.”

“I don’t have time for this.”

“Cas, it’s okay, you probably just have the flu.”

“I have things to do.”

Dean grinned a bit, even as he kneeled down beside him, rubbing his back. “You can do those things after you get back into bed, have some water, and let me handle everything, okay? I’ll put a bucket by the bed and get you a Gravol. Honestly, as long as you’re not pregnant again, I’m fucking happy as a pig in shit to take care of everything.”

“Stop saying that, you’re making me feel panicked,” Cas whispered into the toilet, his eyes wide.

On cue, Gracie released a wail from next door.

“Fuck,” Dean and Cas both groaned.

Dean buried his face in Cas’ neck, exhaling heavily. “When I used to imagine an apple pie life for myself, I’d forgotten to include the parts where babies are cesspools of disease.”

Cas shuddered in his arms. “Don’t call my daughter a cesspool.” 

“Like mother, like daughter.”

He helped Cas as he struggled to stand, and grinned at his own joke, though Cas just looked miserable as he dragged his feet out of the bathroom. Dean made sure to plant a kiss on his cheek before Cas padded back into the bedroom, one arm across his stomach.

“You just tell me if you’re feeling particularly pregnant!” Dean called out over his shoulder.

Cas slammed the door behind him.

***

Grace had decided that sleep was for the weak, after her initial long stretch of deep sleep. After Dean had left Cas in the bathroom, Grace wailed for nearly an hour, stubbornly refusing to eat and leaving a puddle of tears on the shoulder of Dean’s shirt. She managed to puke all down Dean’s arm, in her crib, and bless Dean with another round of gross, explosive pooping that he had to take care of. 

On top of that, Dean heard Cas go back to the bathroom for five more rounds of pitiful, violent sounding puking throughout the night. The retches were so horrible that even Dean felt empathy pain in his stomach and nausea of his own. When Cas stumbled back to bed for good, Dean managed to escape Gracie for a minute to grab a bucket from under the kitchen sink, a glass of water, and a Gravol for Cas. He snuck in some kisses and a cuddle with the former-angel-now-sick-man-baby for about five minutes before he returned to the Screeching Sick Baby Show.

The joys of fatherhood preoccupied him for most of the night, and only when the sunrise peeked through the rickety blinds of Grace’s room did she fall into a sleep that didn’t look as frail as Dean’s mental state.

When he heard Sam come into the house, his keys loud in the front door lock, Dean groaned. He’d forgotten to tell Sam not to come. He had been planning on texting him once Grace had fallen asleep, but when she hadn’t, it had slipped his mind.

Dean felt dizzy as he thumped down the stairs, his hand tight on the railing. Sam was tugging off his touque and throwing his jacket onto a hook behind the door.

When Sam spotted Dean, he smiled big and waved. “Hey!” Then the smile faltered, and his brows knitted together. “Uh… you okay?”

Dean sat down on a step, moping, and rested his head on the rail. “Grace didn’t fall asleep until sixty seconds ago. Cas caught the stomach flu from her and has been hurling all night, and I literally haven’t slept more than an hour and a half in twenty-four hours. How you doin’?”

Sam stared at Dean through wide eyes, but his lip still twitched, his hands slowly tugging at the scarf around his neck to pull it off. “Uh, wow, dude. You could have told me. I could’ve brought over soup or something.”

“I don’t want soup,” Dean whispered, eyes closing against the railing. “I want sleep.”

Sam snorted, holding onto the wall as he toed off his shoes. “Well, I didn’t bring sleep, but I have pie from the bakery in town.”

To his own dismay, Dean’s stomach turned a bit and he sat up on the steps, hugging his middle and leaning forward a bit, elbows on his knees. He swallowed and admitted, “I dunno if I can eat pie right now, Sam.”

His brother, about to walk towards the kitchen, did a double take. “You what?”

Dean looked up apologetically and shrugged. “Pie is all mushy and lumpy,” Dean waved a hand in the air, as if that described ‘mushy’ and ‘lumpy’. “I’ve been surrounded by puke and shit for the last day. You got anything more...solid?”

Sam laughed and nodded towards the kitchen. “I brought a few croissants for myself, but I guess you can have them and I’ll have the pie… Jeeze, you sure you aren’t sick too?”

The brothers filed into the kitchen. Sam set down a white paper box with grease stains on the sides, while Dean slid onto a stool, resting his elbow on the table and his head in his hand. 

Sam set out two plates for them and set orange juice down on the table after fetching it from the fridge. He poured them a glass each, and settled down onto a stool in front of Dean once he’d cut himself a slice of pie and set a fresh croissant on Dean’s plate.

As he took a bite, Sam asked, “So Cas isn’t doing so hot?”

“Oh, he’s hot,” Dean said, flashing Sam a grin. “But yeah, he’s kinda pukey and achy and stuff. Turns into a big man baby when he’s sick. The more you know.”

“So just like you, then?” Sam retorted, raising his fork with a hearty, gooey serving of apple pie. Dean eyed the forkful and swallowed heavily.

“Um… yeah, whatever.”

“How’s Grace?” Sam asked around a mouthful. Dean watched him stab at the pie again and his mouth watered.

“A mess,” Dean replied shortly. He heard footsteps come down the stairs and putter around the main floor.

“Ah, man,” Sam said sympathetically, licking a lump of apple pie off the end of his fork. “Poor girl. You said the doctors said it was fine though? Even though she’s only three months?”

Dean wiped at his mouth and licked his dry lips, his eyes staring at the lumpy mess of pie. His croissant was untouched.

“Yeah, um… They said she’d be fine.”

Castiel dragged himself into the kitchen, a blanket from the living room draped over his shoulders. He looked pale and waxy, his skin shining a bit and his under-eye bags dark. Despite that, he smiled weakly at Sam and croaked, “Morning, Sam.”

Sam smiled and winced empathetically at Cas. “Morning. I heard you’re not doing so well.”

Cas slid onto a stool and wiped at his forehead. “I’ve been vomiting all night. It was very unpleasant.”

With a grin, Sam shrugged and pointed out, “I’m getting flashbacks to like six months ago when you had crazy morning sickness. Are you sure you’re not pregnant?”

Blue eyes rolled at him, while Dean huffed a bit with amusement, though it just sounded like a tired grunt. “That’s what I said.”

“No excess grace lurking around in you, Cas?” Sam asked playfully.

Just as unimpressed as last night, Cas scowled and said through his teeth, “No, Sam. I am not pregnant, and I’d be very pleased if everyone could stop insinuating it. I’m nauseous enough as it is.”

The fork in Sam’s hand flapped in the direction of the white box on the counter. “So, no pie for you?”

“I would rather be run over by a truck,” Cas replied dryly, eyeing the pie.

“Wow.”

“Harsh, Cas.”

Cas shrugged and tugged the blanket around himself tighter. “The food I ate yesterday came back up looking remarkably like the inside of that pie. You would feel the same way if you were—”

“So nauseous,” Dean said, pressing a hand to his mouth.

“Exactly,” Cas agreed curtly.

Sam shoved pie at Dean. “Are you sure you don’t want--”

“I’m so nauseous,” Dean whispered in a rush.

Sam and Cas exchanged looks when Dean struggled out of his seat, pushing away from the table. He launched himself at their sliding door to the backyard and fumbled with the lock.

“Dean?” 

“Gimme a sec, just a sec.” Dean got the door open and leaned out just in time to throw up into a dilapidated flower box the previous owners had left behind. 

Before he threw up again, he heard Cas ask dryly from inside, “Are you pregnant?”

Instead of barking, “Shut up, Cas!”, Dean promptly got sick a few more times, then wiped the tears from his eyes and the sweat on his upper lip with his wrist. 

When Dean pulled himself back into the house, Sam had pushed the pie away from himself and Cas was shivering in the seat, but looking somewhat smug under the blanket, a wry little wobbly smile pressed up against the rim of Dean’s orange juice.

“Not a word,” Dean breathed, hugging himself as the chill of impending fever settled in his bones and his stomach churned.

Cas tilted his head a bit at Dean and asked, “Are you sure you’re not pregnant?”

Sam grinned, while Dean bared his teeth and said through them, “I’m fucking sure, Cas. Jesus.”

Cas shrugged and looked up idly at the ceiling. “Just checking.”

**Author's Note:**

> Drop me a comment to let me know what you thought! :D I appreciate comments so much. They feed my starving author soul.


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